The Crystal Gems Against Swedish DIY Furniture
by PikaScootaloo
Summary: They've fought many adversaries in their endeavors to protect the planet Earth, but even they could never expect this. Watch as Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl face off against their worst foe yet; do-it-yourself furniture with impossible to follow instructions.


**A/N: Takes place during Shirt Club. If you pay attention to both scenes the Gems are in, you'll see exactly how this fits in.**

* * *

"It's here?"

"It's here."

"It's here!"

"Amethyst."

"Garnet."

"No."

"Okay."

Pearl strode in behind Garnet, carrying one of the three boxes while Garnet had two. Amethyst practically bounced on the couch with excitement. Or, rather, literally. She was making quite a mess with the stuffing flying out.

"Amethyst!" Pearl chided, setting the box down on the table harshly. "I don't want to have to fix that again!"

"Sheesh, sorry," Amethyst shrugged, slowing herself down until she was lightly hopping on the furniture. "I'm just so psyched, you know? I mean, who knew humans could actually make something this awesome?"

"We don't know how awesome these things are yet," Garnet noted, dropping the two boxes to the ground with a loud crash.

"Oh, Garnet," Pearl said, frowning with concern. "This might wake Steven up."

"As if," Amethyst snorted, pointing a thumb towards upstairs. "He's already awake. I think he's been busy drawing this guitar thing since before the sun came up. Don't you know how busy he's been with it?"

"Of course we don't know," Pearl huffed. "We were busy going to _get_ all this from the post office!"

"Wait... It took you all night?"

At that, Pearl refused to meet her gaze. "Well, we decided to go to the one... not in Beach City?"

" _You_ decided to," Garnet said. "And only because it took you a while to figure out Beach City _has_ no post office."

Frowning, Pearl said, "Wait, you _knew_?"

Garnet shifted her shades slightly. "Yes."

"Can we just get on with this?" Amethyst groaned. "I wanna build a thing!"

"Not quite yet," Pearl said, taking out a folded sheet of paper and waving it to them. "In order to build this right, we can't just rush into it."

"What, we're actually gonna read the _instruction manual_?"

"Of course," Pearl grinned.

Amethyst groaned even louder, slinking down from the couch to the floor. "Aaagh, how long will it take?!"

"Patience, Amethyst," Garnet advised, sitting down on the couch. "It shouldn't take that long."

"Not long at all!" Pearl affirmed with a grin.

"Uggh..." Amethyst moaned before slinking herself back up the couch and into a sitting position. "This better be quick."

* * *

As it happened, it was not, in fact, quick. A good half hour and some Guitar Dad critique later, Pearl finally set the instructions down on her lap. "Well then... The instructions have been read," she said a bit hesitantly.

"About time," snorted Amethyst. "What do we do first?"

"It's quite simple, really," Pearl said, refusing to meet her eyes. "We just need... err, we might have to... eh..." With each passing trailed-off thought, her hands made gestures that seemed to lead into conveying an idea, only to die down when having nothing to really convey.

"Earth to Pearl," Amethyst said, snapping her fingers in front of her face. "Do you know what to do or not?!"

Pearl huffed. "Of course I..." And then sighed in defeat. "...don't."

Amethyst gave an untamed howl. "Forget it! I'm doing mine myself!"

"Wait! The directions, I'm sure they can make sense. It must be just a schematic error!"

The purple Gem paid her no heed as she tore open her box and started rifling through the parts. "It's not that hard to build a stupid stool, Pearl!"

"But the instructions!" Pearl demanded, then turned to address Garnet. "Please tell Amethyst not to—Garnet!"

Garnet turned around, with her hands still holding the cardboard flaps of her now opened box, and shrugged. "It shouldn't be hard."

Pearl gave a few incoherent babbles that faintly resembled an argument before dissolving into a strangled cry of frustration. "The INSTRUCTIONS!"

And with that, Pearl made another disgusted cry before stomping off and scrutinizing the instructions thoroughly, leaving the other two to their own devices.

* * *

"Is this some kind of JOKE?!" Amethyst roared.

"I TOLD YOU."

"YOU'RE NOT DOIN' ANY BETTER, BIRD NOSE."

"LEAVE MY STOOL AND MY NOSE ALONE," Pearl yelled, running her fingers through her hair as she went from instructions to unassembled stool to instructions again. "There has to be SOME WAY to build this!"

"Your mutterings AREN'T HELPING," howled Amethyst as she wrung her face just looking at how none of these pieces fit together.

" _Gems_ ," Garnet said in a low but deadly voice. "Don't let this get the better of you." She tapped her chin with a stool leg, looking down at all the pieces still left out.

"I just—I don't..." At this point, Pearl was lying flat on the floor, clawing at all the pieces in a futile effort to fit them together. "How can humans have the capabilities to construct such horribly impossible furniture?!"

"RRAGH I'M GONNA GO NUTS HERE!" Amethyst screamed, getting so angry that she was tearing up. She grabbed a stool leg and started bashing the floor.

"WHY."

 _BASH!_

"IS THIS."

 _BASH!_

"A THING?!"

 _BASH! BASH! ..._

...Her pounds of fury tired out, the only thing left in her was an empty sorrow. "Stupid stools... S-Stupid humans, stupid impossibility!" She sniffed a few times before trying to keep it in. "If we don't figure this out, we're gonna be stuck doin' this FOREVER."

* * *

"A-Ahha! We're done!" Pearl regarded her stool with weary pride. She might not have been able to replicate it fully, but it was as good as it was going to get. Panting, she turned to the other Gems. "How did yours come along?"

Amethyst kicked her deformed stool, and it somehow managed to stay intact. "Eh, it's a stool."

"And Garnet?"

Pearl peered over and saw stool pieces mashed together in absolutely no way that would make it look even slightly like a stool.

Garnet just shrugged.

Amethyst retired to the couch. "That killed a bit of me inside. Please don't tell me we've got a mission or something, 'cause I am NOT ready to do anything else today."

"Nope," Garnet said, sitting down as well. "This is still our free day."

"Thank heavens," Pearl sighed in relief, taking her place on the couch. "Who would've thought anything human made with the name IKEA could have caused so much distress?"

"Can we agree to never speak of this again?" Amethyst suggested.

And in unison, Pearl and Garnet both replied, "Agreed."

* * *

 **A/N: No joke, Pearl is actually reading IKEA instructions, and the Gems wind up with one correctly built stool, one misshapen stool, and one...thing, of mangled up parts, all in the episode.**

 **Polymorphic sentient rocks of a hyper advanced species done in by DIY furniture.**


End file.
